“If you have built castles in the air, your work need not be lost; that is where they should be. Now put the foundations under them.” -- Henry David Thoreau

Reviews and ratings are a part of this work. The good ones are a blessing, the negative ones are too. It means people are reading. It means they have questions and ideas and suggestions. And most importantly it means they have maybe found a bit of happiness in what I've written.So if you've read all or part of The Guardian Chronicles, let your voice be heard. Tell me what you think about them. I welcome any and all feedback.

“Change is the end of something you know and the beginning of something else that you don't know. Something new that holds opportunities.” ― Kholoud Yasser

I have loved writing The Guardian Chronicles, and I have loved sharing it with you. But now I think it's time to start something different. Here's to new beginnings, twists on old tales,... and very messy pages.

“Music expresses that which cannot be put into words and that which cannot remain silent” -- Victor Hugo

​As I near the (hypothetical) ending of the series, I'd like to share the music that helped inspire the 4th and final book of The Guardian Chronicles: Give Up the Ghost. And while the novel is still a work in progress, music has always been what keeps me focus and drives me to write. So here are the songs that brought out the best story, and perhaps only, story I could tell.

﻿“Never put off till tomorrow what may be done day after tomorrow just as well.” -- Mark Twain﻿

"I've been busy."We've all said it. We've all made excuses. We've all rationalized why we can't or won't or might not ever do something we said we would. That being said... I've been busy. Hopefully with a string of free days coming up, I will have time to once again write, and maybe, just maybe, finish The Guardian Chronicles like I set out months ago to do. So to immortalize my shame, here are a few of the distractions I have not been able to overcome, and the reasons I haven't been writing as of late. They may not all make sense, but believe me, they are very real.

Green Day (yeah, I said it.)

Dishes

Disney World

Boyfriend

Invader Zim

Automobile breakdowns

Mental breakdowns

Post-apocalyptic space stations. (Aside: For those of you who haven't read The 100 by Kass Morgan or watched the tv show based on it, I would highly recommend it.)

Dinosaurs and Chris Pratt

Sleep

Lack of sleep

Facebook

Waffles

Brandi Carlile (For whom I give my free time willingly and without shame.)

"They say forgiveness is divine. I’ve often wondered about that. Divinity isn’t inherent, and forgiveness isn’t something we’re born with. Forgiveness is something we adapt to, something we learn, however painful the lesson. It’s only after we learn to forgive the ones we love the most that we come to understand just how divine it can be."

I am very pleased to announce the release of my third book, The Dead of Winter. It continues the story of Billie Foster and her partner, Tucker Reid, as they work under the charming, yet suspicious new department head, Malcolm. Chaos, of course, ensues. The book is now available to purchase in paperback and in Kindle format from Amazon.Happy reading!

“He was a writer and words were his weapons.”- Christopher Moore,Bloodsucking Fiends﻿Someone asked me the other day, “Out of everything you’ve written, what part was your favorite?” I could have chosen a particular scene or quip or character. But without hesitating, I answered with this.“Who we are is determined by the actions we take, the words we choose to say, the people we love. And for some that love brings hope. For others, courage. And for some, the luckiest of individuals, that love brings with it a knowledge of contentment, an understanding of strength, and the reward of uncovering exactly who you are.”So in the vein of tradition, and the idea that perhaps you have favorite of your own and cling to words of literary giants of the past and present like I do, here are a few more lines I wish I’d written.

“We cross our bridges as we come to them and burn them behind us, with nothing to show for our progress except a memory of the smell of smoke, and the presumption that once our eyes watered.”—Tom Stoppard,Rosencratz and Guildenstern Are Dead“And if you were a spirit, and time did not bind you, and patience and love were all you knew, then there you would wait for someone to return, and the story to unfold.”- Mark Helprin, In Sunlight and In Shadow

(Quite possibly, at least in my opinion, the most expressive writer of our time.)“She wasn’t doing a thing that I could see, except standing there leaning on the balcony railing, holding the universe together.”—J. D. Salinger, “A Girl I Knew”“I love you,' Buttercup said. 'I know this must come as something of a surprise to you, since all I've ever done is scorn you and degrade you and taunt you, but I have loved you for several hours now, and every second, more.─William Goldman, The Princess Bride

“Blessed are the meek, for to them we shall say "attaboy".”─Christopher Moore, Lamb: The Gospel According to Biff, Christ’s Childhood Pal

“But this road doesn't go anywhere,” I told him.“That doesn't matter.”“What does?” I asked, after a little while.“Just that we're on it, dude,” he said.” ― Bret Easton Ellis, Less Than Zero

“A bird in the hand was worth two in the bush, he told her, to which she retorted that a proverb was the last refuge of the mentally destitute.”― W. Somerset Maugham, The Painted Veil

“Ah, but you're the insidious type--Jane Eyre with of touch of Becky Sharp. A thoroughly dangerous girl.”― Dodie Smith, I Capture the Castle

“There are moments in your life when you see yourself through someone else’s eyes, when your only hope of believing you’re capable of doing something is because someone else believes it for you.”― Marc Acito, How I Paid for College: A Novel of Sex, Theft, Friendship & Musical Theater

“I did the searching and remembering, she did the disappearing and the forgetting.”― Ann Brashares, My Name is MemoryGod pity them both! and pity us all,Who vainly the dreams of youth recall;For of all sad words of tongue or pen, The saddest are these: "It might have been!"─John Greenleaf Whittier, “Maud Muller”

"Unfortunately the clock is ticking, the hours are going by."--Haruki Murakami, Dance, Dance DanceAlbert Einstein once said that “Time is an illusion”. Why then does it feel all too real whenever I have pressing matters to put down on paper? Or maybe it only feels that way when there is less of it? The clock ticks by and we find ourselves more aware that it even existed.So when do you find the time to write? I suppose the better question would be “Where do you find the time to write?”. It almost feels as though sometimes I am plucking the minutes out of thin air. There are only so many hours in a day, and often your precious time is already claimed by work or friends or obligations or family or… life. So you write when you can, in pocket journals, on scraps of paper, on receipts. (Aside: I once wrote an entire chapter on a roll of receipt tape as it was the only means of writing material I could find. End of aside.) You scribble down ideas and names, and promise that you’ll come back to them later, praying you don’t lose them in the process. My purse, for instance, is often times a bottomless pit from which notes never return.But what do you do when you have not only one idea to get down on paper… but two? Do you pick the one that has been tugging at your brain? Or do you choose the one that is a responsibility to finish, the one that should be a priority? Choosing between the two is like choosing which child is your favorite. (*Try not to have favorite children.) The only answers it to attempt to write both and hope that the storylines don’t get crossed along the way. *If this entry seems slightly on the short side, it’s probably because I’m low on time.…see what I did there?

The perfect sentence. The often memorized, head spinning, sucker punch to the gut line. The one that sticks with you long after you finish a book. The one you dissect and cling to for whatever the reason, that’s the dream. To be able to create something that lingers in a person’s mind is the reason many of us write in the first place. I have my fair share of prized sentences. They’re the ones I turn back to over and over again. They’re the ones that I can flip to and find easily because they rest on pages that align with cracked and overly bent spines. They made me laugh and think and remember. So in the spirit of pursuing the glorious and often sought perfect line, I present a few of my personal favorites.

*Possible spoilers. I apologize in advance.

“Peter Lake had no illusions about mortality. He knew that it made everyone perfectly equal, and that the treasures of the earth were movement, courage, laughter, and love. The wealthy could not buy these things. On the contrary, they were for the taking.” ― Mark Helprin, Winter's Tale

“My gosh, Nick, why are you so wonderful to me?' He was supposed to say: You deserve it. I love you.But he said,'Because I feel sorry for you.' 'Why?' 'Because every morning you have to wake up and be you.” ― Gillian Flynn, Gone Girl

“Heaven did not seem to be my home; and I broke my heart with weeping to come back to earth; and the angels were so angry that they flung me out into the middle of the heath on the top of Wuthering Heights; where I woke sobbing for joy.” ― Emily Brontë, Wuthering Heights

“Things we lose have a way of coming back to us in the end, if not always in the way we expect.” ― J.K. Rowling, Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix

“I want to do something splendid...something heroic or wonderful that won't be forgotten after I'm dead. I don't know what, but I'm on the watch for it and mean to astonish you all someday.” ― Louisa May Alcott, Little Women

“In eight years not a day has gone by when she hasn’t thought of him. She misses him and she wants him back. I want my best friend back, she thinks, because without him nothing is good and nothing is right.” ― David Nicholls, One Day

“some men neverdieand some men neverlive

but we're all alivetonight.” ― Charles Bukowski, You Get So Alone at Times That it Just Makes Sense

“We cast a shadow on something wherever we stand, and it is no good moving from place to place to save things; because the shadow always follows. Choose a place where you won't do harm - yes, choose a place where you won't do very much harm, and stand in it for all you are worth, facing the sunshine.” ― E.M. Forster, A Room with a View

“It was early Saturday afternoon, and I hadn’t gotten dressed yet. Beth pointed to my pajama and life-jacket ensemble and asked what I was doing.“I keep having these dreams that I’m drowning,” I answered. “Figured I’d go to sleep prepared.”’─Janet Tashjian, The Gospel According to Larry

“So when at times the mob is swayedTo carry praise or blame too far,We may choose something like a starTo stay our minds on and be staid.”─ Robert Frost, Choose Something Like a Star“I read somewhere... how important it is in life not necessarily to be strong, but to feel strong... to measure yourself at least once.” ― Jon Krakauer, Into the Wild

“It is required of every man," the ghost returned, "that the spirit within him should walk abroad among his fellow-men, and travel far and wide; and, if that spirit goes not forth in life, it is condemned to do so after death. It is doomed to wander through the world — oh, woe is me! — and witness what it cannot share, but might have shared on earth, and turned to happiness!” ― Charles Dickens, A Christmas Carol

Rebecca's Email List

About Rebecca

Rebecca was born in Ocala, FL but grew up in Eastern TN where she currently lives with two very spoiled cats. After a brief stint with higher education, she began her career tour-de-force as a receptionist, a smoothie maker, a waitress, and a retail clerk before finding her niche as a bookseller. She enjoys making people laugh, but has a strange passion for bittersweet endings. When she's not writing, she enjoys traveling, solving crossword puzzles, singing karaoke, and dancing the robot. Favorite authors include: Christopher Moore, Henry James, Chuck Klosterman, Ken Follett, and J.K. Rowling.